The Historic (And Sometimes Insane) Health Care Debate In 10 Minutes (VIDEO)

Last night's historic health care vote capped off more than a year's worth of heated, emotional and often rancorous debate that touched on issues substantive, procedural and superficial. The dramatic, sometimes hysterical, elements of the process all came bursting into light on the House floor Sunday.

The Huffington Post has boiled down that extraordinary 11-hour debate, which lasted late through Sunday evening, into a 10-minute video. For political junkies, it's a telling summarization of the just how sharp the partisan fault-lines have become. For historians, it's window into a momentous moment in social policy. For humorists it's, well, a guilty pleasure. At the very least, it's a microcosm of the yearlong process that brought health care legislation -- for the first time in nearly 100 years -- to the brink of being law.

Video produced by HuffPost's Ben Craw.

Comments

[BlueDingoDog]

11:55 PM on 03/23/2010

John McCain's Republican America

http://www.youtube.com/user/LostMessageInABottle#p/a/u/0/n9f4kbVhkns

Worth Repeating:

For republicans life begins at conception and ends at birth!

[Stellaire]

06:33 PM on 03/23/2010

congratulations to the american people. You have made the right choice. I live in france and Canada (who are nt socialist countries) and I am proud of our health care system.

[BlueDemon508]

01:51 PM on 03/23/2010

I want to see a Unnecessary Censorship "Health Care Debate" Jimmy Kimmel. Come on Jimmy!!!

[jimfixit]

07:59 AM on 03/23/2010

With Health Care passing (Yes We Can), maybe the checks these tro11s get wil bonce. You can't fix stupid! Can't be done.

[jesuswazasocialist]

04:26 AM on 03/23/2010

If the government gets so bad which country should I move to .... Australia.

[jesuswazasocialist]

04:25 AM on 03/23/2010

I'm a radical and proud of it.

[jesuswazasocialist]

04:24 AM on 03/23/2010

For the life of me I don't understand why any one would vote against something that is good for the majority of Americans.

[jesuswazasocialist]

04:23 AM on 03/23/2010

I live in a country Australia that has socialized medicine and I didn't know that I lived in a Socialist Utopia.

[rgilley]

03:38 PM on 03/23/2010

We here in the US have to suffer through a myriad of right wing conservative misinformation.
Unfortunately.

[YunekFlava]

03:19 AM on 03/23/2010

That clip of John Bonehead will definitely be used during the November election. You can bet your sun tan on that.

[JenInOhio]

04:00 PM on 03/23/2010

He is one angry republican, isn't he? Wow.

[Dogma]

02:40 AM on 03/23/2010

Bohner looks like a hysterical carrot in that one clip.

[andyx1205]

02:08 AM on 03/23/2010

Republicans:

Redistribution of wealth from the top 5% to the 95% of Americans = Communism

Redistribution of wealth from 95% of Americans to the Banks, and tax breaks for the top 5% = American

[laresistance]

01:10 AM on 03/23/2010

Wow, Boenner's head simply exploded.

[JenInOhio]

04:06 PM on 03/23/2010

Did you think green goo might explode out of his head? I did. Anger management is in his future, or a stroke.

[billbb]

12:28 AM on 03/23/2010

The dynamic of watching Boehner was interesting... He looked for all the world like a third-rate comic with flop sweat hanging off his nose. He knew he had lost - lost the vote, lost the battle, lost the room. There is that wild look when you see a comedian who knows he doesn't have the stuff tonight trying everything short of setting himself on fire to get the audience back. That is how Agent Orange stuck me last night. Working the room for all he was worth, but knew in the first seconds that he didn't have the spark and wasn't going to pull it off. A really great one with heart digs in at that point, wins over the audience and pulls out courageously with great flourish, killing in the end. Boehner just laid an egg - and knew it. He smelled the bus to Palookaville, and feared he'd be taking the ride for having made the big grandstand play and muffed it. No courage. He'd be yellow, if he wasn't already dyed the same orange as Cheese Curls.

[indiethinker]

11:53 PM on 03/22/2010

This is what the Republican Party, through their words & deeds, have told the American people:

"We are willing to spend trillions of dollars to send U.S. military forces all over this planet & to give away tax breaks to the wealthy, but we draw the line at spending money to improve the health & welfare of ordinary Americans, because that will bankrupt us. We condone torture, illegal wiretapping, putting people away in prisons without benefit of attorneys or trials, but reforming health care will be the death of freedom & democracy. We enjoy our wealth & power & we will not willingly give up one penny of our money to improve the lives of the lazy, unwashed masses who should be grateful to work in our factories & fields so that our wealth can increase even more. Any attempt to improve the system to make it fairer is socialist, treasonous & unconstitutional. Despite the fact that the people of the United States elected Barack Obama president, along with a solid majority in both the Senate & the House, we consider this administration to be illegitimate & will continue to fight every attempt to make positive changes for this country. We are greedy, we are fear-mongers, we are haters, we are racists, we are hypocritical & we will continue to exploit the ignorance & gullibility of that portion of the population that seems all too willing to let us continue to poison the American political system."

[toppermost]

01:59 AM on 03/23/2010

This is absolutely perfect. Bravo! :-)

[Dogma]

02:55 AM on 03/23/2010

Nice.

[inonoatama]

11:37 PM on 03/22/2010

The thing we keep hearing, for example, from Jeff Bingaman (D, NM), is how the US is trending toward "European style social democracy." And that, they say, will squelch the "rugged individuals" — the "entrepreneurs" and "risk takers" that made this country great. Well, I have a news flash. 90% of the American public works for someone else, more often than not, a big corporation.

Some myths are just immortal, you know?